The High Court has ordered the surrender of Andrius Ščiuka to Lithuania to serve the remaining 2 years, 8 months and 12 days of a seven-year prison sentence.
In a judgment delivered on 18 January 2021, Mr Justice Paul Burns dismissed objections to surrender under the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003. The order was made under section 16(1), after the court found surrender was not precluded by the Act.
The warrant, issued on 14 February 2017, sought enforcement of a sentence imposed for armed robbery involving a group and illegal possession of firearms. The court said the remaining sentence exceeded the four-month minimum gravity threshold. It also found the issuing authority’s certification concerning the armed robbery offence was sufficiently clear after receiving additional information, and that corresponding offences existed under Irish law. The respondent did not pursue an objection based on lack of correspondence.
The respondent argued that the warrant was unclear about the sentence remaining and that enforcement was statute-barred. The warrant contained different figures for the time left to serve, but the issuing judicial authority explained that he had served a further 10 days after being conditionally released, leaving 2 years, 8 months and 12 days.
The court said the issuing authority’s initial explanation of the limitation period was unclear, possibly due to translation. Further information clarified that the period for executing the remaining sentence would not expire until 3 August 2022. The judge rejected the objections based on section 11 and Lithuanian limitation law.
The respondent also objected that surrender would expose him to inhuman or degrading prison conditions and breach other rights under the European Convention on Human Rights. An affidavit from his solicitor recounted the respondent’s account of crowded cells and poor conditions during imprisonment in Lithuania, which ended in June 2006. The judge found that account was not up-to-date, cogent or objective and that no other supporting evidence had been provided. The court also found no evidence that the respondent’s personal or family circumstances were so exceptional as to justify refusing surrender.
The court therefore rejected the section 37 objections and ordered surrender. The judgment records the order; it does not state that the surrender had already taken place.